Chapter One #3
I’d managed to scrub off the “B,” so only the “itch” remained.
The one letter had already cost me an hour, so I’d given up. I figured I’d leave it up until Halloween and turn it into Wicked Witch, paint my face green. Seemed fitting for the town pariah.
My house was smaller than some people’s garages, but it was home.
I’d contemplated finding somewhere else to live, in a town where the population didn’t hate me, but Mom was in Wild Fields.
When my life in Nashville had imploded and I had crumbled, she’d been my only support system.
Her best friend, Renee, had helped too, had given me a job away from the prying eyes of the general public.
And it wasn’t like I still hated this town—I’d just been a little too young and a little too loud when I’d left five years ago.
Plus, I really loved my house. Nestled between trees, the little cabin called me forward and each step carried me faster toward the porch.
The wind chime by the door was ringing, tossed back and forth in the weather.
Hands slippery and trembling, I fumbled my key into the lock.
I finally stepped into the perfectly shielded dry interior, when I felt the snap on my shoulder.
My bag dropped, spilling its guts across the floor. Makeup, tampons, an old smoothie bottle, coins…
Fucking. Great. Exactly what I needed.
I sighed and dropped to my knees, my skirt turning into a disgusting wet blanket around me, as I shoveled things aside just enough to close the door.
My phone had somehow landed screen-down on a broken metal claw clip.
So when I picked it up, the screen was a spiderweb of cracks, held together by the thin plastic protective film that clearly didn’t do a lot of protecting.
So much for not being able to afford a new phone.
“Makes sense…” I dropped back against the door, my eyes burning and my chest tight.
Exhaustion gnawed at me. I was somehow both hot and cold, and I was drenched, and my feet hurt, and my car was fucked, and I hated bartending in a stupid period costume, and my phone had shattered, and my favorite bag had ripped, and my beautiful cherry-red mailbox was ruined, and…
and I…I just didn’t want to get back up.
If I got back up, I’d have to do this whole shit show all over again tomorrow.
I’d have to serve drinks to dozens of people who hated me for something stupid I did years ago, and I’d have to fix things that shouldn’t be broken in the first place.
I couldn’t do this anymore.
I’d spent months trying to smile and bear it, to show people that I was happy to be here. I tried so hard to make them move on. I didn’t even need them to like me. I just needed them to tolerate me.
Based on my blurred vision and burning eyes, I was crying, but I couldn’t distinguish the tears from the water dripping from my hair.
My eyes raked over the wall of photographs above my sofa.
I could hardly make them out in the dark, but I knew every pixel in every single one of them by heart.
The stages I played on, the audiences I played for, the musical geniuses I played with.
If that Adriana could see me now, she’d kick my ass.
The Adriana in those pictures was on top of the world.
This Adriana was a literal puddle of misery.
My blurred gaze stuck to the vague shape of the man that was in most of those photos. If I could have been bothered to wipe my tears away, I would have seen a cowboy hat and a dark mustache, his usual attire of a white shirt and tight blue jeans.
The Adriana in those pictures had never been afraid to ask country music legend Brooks Monroe for anything.
I unlocked my phone and breathed a sigh of relief when it lit up and still let me into my texts, and despite all the cracks in the screen, the keyboard only had some issues letting me type the letter “B”—but thankfully autocorrect fixed my B-less texts.
I wouldn’t have to scrape together sofa crack coins for a new phone just yet.
I pushed aside the doubts about the months it’d been since we’d last texted, and about the time of night. If he didn’t feel like texting at 1:30 in the morning, he better have his phone on mute.
Adriana: Hey Brooks! Hope you’re doing well and all that small talk.
I’ll cut to the chase: Remember how you promised me a huge favor the night the tour got cancelled?
I need to cash it in. Any chance you want to play a tiny concert in a tiny saloon in a tiny Wild West theme park an hour and a half outside of Nashville?
It’s no stadium but the sound is great. I could really use some brownie points with the people here. Desperately, Addie
Cringing at how formal that sounded, I immediately second-guessed myself. Was I basically asking him to work for free? Sure. But why had I signed the message as if he didn’t have me in his contacts?
I contemplated just lying down, letting the cold and my rain-soaked clothes weigh me down, maybe sleeping for three days straight. My eyes were just drifting shut when my phone buzzed in my palm.
Brooks: Okay! When?